Jimmy Iovine Quotes

The record business sucks!

I love music and musicians. And seeing great artists dropped from labels was really frustrating and sad to me.

The music industry is in such poor shape; it's in a really bad way, and a lot of people in the industry are very depressed.

The record industry is a world within itself.

You rarely get money out of labels, except for when they open up a budget for a project. Other than that, it's a do-or-die type thing.

The music industry is very small.

For new bands, I think a major label is the safest place to be. Independent labels are the ones getting away with murder. A lot of them are hobbyists who rip-off young bands, taking advantage of people who would never get signed to a major.

I got me a hit record and I ain't never made a cent from it.

Most artists, you know, you spend their entire lives learning how to play music and write songs, and they don't really know how the music business works.

With music, you've got to find ways to get paid again, 'cause all the cool kids in junior high school and high school, they think you're wack if you pay for music.

You gotta' sell a million records before you talk about getting paid at a major [label].

Getting a record deal is a meaningless thing now.

I have inherited two of the most important brands in hip-hop, Def Jam and Roc-A-Fella. Reid and Universal Music Group have given me the opportunity to manage the companies I have contributed to my whole career. I feel this is a giant step for me and the entire artist community.

I never, ever had it in my mind that I wanted to be in the record industry, because I still contend that the record industry is an insidious affair. It's this terrible collision between art and commerce, and it will always be that way.

I don't get involved in record label politics.

It's not like it used to be where everybody has a record company to belong to.

Downloadable music is the biggest musical phenomenon since the Beatles, and the music industry is slow to come to grips with that.

That's my favorite subject because it really levels the playing field for artists these days. You don't have to sell out to the record company. You don't have to get a five hundred thousand dollars, or whatever, and pay them back for the rest of your life to record a record.

There are no record companies in Waikiki.

As a person, I've been in the business since 1969, and I never remember getting an honest count based upon how many records been sold for Burning Spear.

By now all rock bands are wise enough to be suspicious of music industry scum.

'Vinyl' is a good look at the music industry. The script was honest.

I truly believe, as an institution, most major labels should just die.

Music and the music business are two different things.

The labels are in a jam. For a company to do well in music now, it's got to be in all aspects of the business. And Live Nation is the risk-taker. It's leading the charge.